There is any philosophical interest in funeral doom? Can we give some philosophical meaning to the visions that funeral doom creates? How can we understand funeral doom in philosophical terms? Is there any link between contemporary philosophy and the visions and the messages of funeral doom? Or any type of doom?

Thu Jul 12, 2007 6:25 pm

Cruel Shoes

what the heck? I see Funeral Doom as the musical equivalent to nightmares. that's my philosophy.

Thu Jul 12, 2007 6:45 pm

persist

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no, not in persistence in mourning anyway. i cant really claim to be philosophically inspired, as i take all of 2 minutes (and no thought) to write the lyrics. im with cruel shoes, i try to create a nightmarish atmosphere, and that's it. in fact, i may stop writing lyrics altogether, and just indestinguishably grunt and scream. no philosophy, no meaning, just fear.

Thu Jul 12, 2007 7:25 pm

Malina

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Cruel Shoes wrote:

what the heck? I see Funeral Doom as the musical equivalent to nightmares. that's my philosophy.

nightmares? but hmm...it's so calm and relaxing I find it dreamy. Don't know how to describe it in philosophycal terms though...for me, it's beauty

Is there any link between contemporary philosophy and the visions and the messages of funeral doom?

What are THE messages and visions of funeral doom? I think every band has their own. If you generally mean sadness, suicidal tendencies, pessimism, hate against society and things like that, you could read some of Emil Ciorans texts...

But I wouldn't dare call this "philosophy".

Last edited by Enki on Thu Jul 12, 2007 8:08 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Thu Jul 12, 2007 7:58 pm

Malina

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Re: The philosophical side of funeral doom

Enki wrote:

silencioeterno wrote:

Is there any link between contemporary philosophy and the visions and the messages of funeral doom?

What are THE messages and visions of funeral doom? If you mean things like sadness, suicidal tendencies, pessimism, hate against society and things like that, you could read some of Emil Ciorans texts...

But I wouldn't dare call this "philosophy".

hihi, I was just about to mention him...he has some great tezts about music I liked the thign he said in the book of deceits: you cannot understand the music if it doesn't make you feel alive and another one was the way he started the book: musical ectasy: I feel how I loose my matter, how the physical resistences break down and I fall into the ambience and vibrations of some inner melodies

Emil Cioran? I know him very well!
I think that all the problems, subjects, and themes that are related to funeral doom - despair, sadness, the beauty of mourn - are all philosophical problems and perenial philosophical themes. I think it is very important to understand and think more profoundly about the aesthetical and philosophical essence of funeral doom. Funeral doom is more than themes about sadness, pessimism, hate again society, i understand the experience of listening to funeral doom as an aesthetical and metaphisical experience that is not related to any other in music.
Persist said: i try to create a nightmarish atmosphere, and that's it. in fact, i may stop writing lyrics altogether, and just indestinguishably grunt and scream. no philosophy, no meaning, just fear -
I think fear is a fundamental philosophical problem. Why and what we fear. The horror and the nightmarish side of life is a fundamental part of the existence and it is very important to thing about it, isnt it? And the beauty of sadness, the beauty of mourning, that is - as Malina pointed - a fundamental part of funeral doom, is an important and fundamental aesthetical problem: Why we fell what other try to avoid as a experience of beauty?
Do you see or found any philosophical problem in death metal, black metal, or in grindcore? I don't, and why? I think because its lyrics and themes are not related with existencial or metaphical or aesthetical problems. Do you agree with me? And if you dont why not?
Any one of you can discuss about Martin Heidegger, F. Nietzche, or other philosophers?

Fri Jul 13, 2007 2:01 am

Deek

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How is fear a problem? I think it's how we know we're alive. fear is what will generally get the adrenaline running.

What Malina was getting at, right when i read she said about the beauty of it, i thought of Shape of Despair. obviously not all funeral doom is like this, SOD is one of the more melodic, if not the most melodic, funeral bands out there. despite the sadness in their music, there's definitely beauty in it. in the lyrics, too, just the way they are written.

beauty is a whole different matter of opinion, though. i'll use Opeth and Acid Bath as examples. Opeth, in my opinion, has some of the best written lyrics in the metal world today. tied in with the music and Akerfeldt's singing style, Opeth has some of the most beautiful metal music today, with Blackwater Park being the pinacle of all this tying together IMO. As for Acid Bath, although the lyrics can be disturbing at times (to those not used to metal, anyway), those lyrics are some of the most beautiful and poetic lyrics i know of in metal. "Scream of the Butterfly", especially. as someone put it once, tehy're "poetically disturbing".

and for philisophical problem in death metal, black metal and grindcore? there's definitely some death metal where the themes relate to existential views.

but, what you mean by metaphical problems, existential problems and aesthetical problems?

_________________"The end, again, comes quickly. There will be no pity. A process of revealing. With no apologies, no regrets, she said destroy. Destroy, she said..."

Fri Jul 13, 2007 4:12 am

silencioeterno

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[quote="Deek"]How is fear a problem? I think it's how we know we're alive. fear is what will generally get the adrenaline runnin

When i am talking about fear as a problem i am thinking about the meaning of fear, not only about the experience of fear. It is common to relate experience with meaning but it is not the same thing. You can experience fear, but you can aswell understand what is fear, and why life and existence is made of a more deeply and profound sense of fear. Fear is not only adrenaline, but you can think fear in a metaphisical sense, as a sense of anguish that transcend you - i'm not speaking in a religious way - as something that you don't understand but simply seduces you or maybe hount you.

[Quote Deek] What Malina was getting at, right when i read she said about the beauty of it, i thought of Shape of Despair. obviously not all funeral doom is like this, SOD is one of the more melodic, if not the most melodic, funeral bands out there. despite the sadness in their music, there's definitely beauty in it. in the lyrics, too, just the way they are written.

Of course Malina is talking about the experience of listening to some funeral doom bands, as you can understand a profoud sense of emptiness when you are listening to "until death overtakes you", or you can experiment a tortured sense of anguish in Torture Whell, or in My Shamefull. Or you can fell the "beauty of screams" in the last album of Esoteric. You certainly can fell and sense a lot of things, but there is something more than that, and that is my point. I'm trying to share a philosophical view of funeral doom that is beyond senses, and experiences of listening to music, or is beyond the meaning of lyrics. And that is the problematic sense and aesthetical, metaphisical and existencial sense of funeral doom, it an understanding of a more profound and complex view of funeral doom. Trying to put this ideas in a more easy way to understand it. You can look at the pictures - that can be seen in other topic - of graves, and extremly sadness, or even horror and you enjoy it, as you can feel the "poetically disturbing" side of lyrics or the music of "Scream of the butterfly" and feel something that you call and understand as beuty, and why you do that? Why you understand that feeling and that sense as that? What is the aesthetical meaning of that experience? When you undertand the poetic sense of some lyrics, what is the sense of that? What is the poetical sense of some lyrics? Why that experience that is "poetically disturbing" seduces you? Why emptiness, or anguish, or sadness seduces us? Is this that i'm talking about.

It is normal to understand metaphisic as related to religion or something like that, but it is not true, you can understand the anguish and the experience of horror or seduction as a metaphisical problem, and a very very important metaphisical problem. Death is obviously a very important metaphisical problem, and the experience or the visions and the understanding of death are metaphisical problems. And Funeral doom is obviously about that. Aesthetical problem - the experience of listening or understanding a lyric or a music is an aesthetical problem, and it is very important problem in philosophical sense. Philosophy is not only a kind of esoteric thing, it is a very pratical thing, its more about understanding why we do this, and why we think that, but it transcend all that to create a vision and a compreensive compreension of the experiences and the behaviors of all man, and in the case of funeral doom, the compreension of it essence, that i believe is beyond the lyrics, and music.

Sorry but i dont found any philosophical problem in grindcore, death metal, please give me cases where i can find that.

Fri Jul 13, 2007 11:26 am

persist

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i dont see fear as a philosophical problem. maybe i didnt explain myself properly, i dont touch on philosophy in my lyrics, but maybe there is an existential side of the music and sounds themselves. i think everyone interprets it differently.

Fri Jul 13, 2007 1:48 pm

Haman

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I would say that there is no philosophy inherently related to funeral doom.

Generally speaking, I could be wrong but I believe that music by itself is no vehicle for philosophy.

Lyrics are.

Music could, in my opinion, be considered as a very powerful tool for evocation, the purely emotional stimulus thanks to which the philosophy (if there is any) behind the lyrics can penetrate the mind and soul of the listener.

Persist said: i dont see fear as a philosophical problem. maybe i didnt explain myself properly, i dont touch on philosophy in my lyrics, but maybe there is an existential side of the music and sounds themselves. i think everyone interprets it differently.

I know that you don't see fear as a philosophical problem, but as you can understand i see it as a problem. I understand the metaphisical side and the metaphisical perspective of fear, not only in his existencial perspective of fear. What i am trying to explain is that fear is not only a kind of perspective that you have of live, or something that can made you act in a certain way, but it is also - and to me especially - a form that helps to understand life, but you can transcend all this perspectives when you think about the metaphisical essence of fear, i.e, fear as a tool to create a essential vision of life. Trying to made it easier to you understand what i'm trying to say. Think about death, what is your idea of death, and about death? Death as i said is a fundamental metaphisical problem, and it is totaly related with fear, don't you think? Your vision of life is related to your vision of death, you can think one hour about death, or obsessaly think about death, and live with the conscience of "finitudine (latin term, i expect you understand it)", and you also can live avoiding the fear of that finitudine, of the horror of death, and you can live your life as a seek for pleasure, or trying to have some fun. And that fear, or that necessity of living with the beauty conscience of death can definitively made you live in a certain way, and not in other. Now try to put this in a diferent way, and give it a more dense and profound meaning, and then you have what a call a metaphisical essence of thinking fear, or even death. I expect you have a philosophical mind.

Fri Jul 13, 2007 2:55 pm

persist

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interesting points. i guess i neve really thought about it. i try to create the sound of fear, but this is the first time ive ever thought about why. interesting.

Fri Jul 13, 2007 3:58 pm

Deek

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going along with Haman said, there isn't any philosophy inherent to any music style, really. yea, you may have some similar themes, but nothing is sacred to any style. there are all sorts of different lyrical themes in each form of music.

persist wrote:

interesting points. i guess i neve really thought about it. i try to create the sound of fear, but this is the first time ive ever thought about why. interesting.

but at the same time, why does any artist, music or otherwise, try to create any kind of feeling? love, hate, fear, power, so on and so forth.

silencioeterno wrote:

Why emptiness, or anguish, or sadness seduces us? Is this that i'm talking about.

It is normal to understand metaphisic as related to religion or something like that, but it is not true, you can understand the anguish and the experience of horror or seduction as a metaphisical problem, and a very very important metaphisical problem. Death is obviously a very important metaphisical problem, and the experience or the visions and the understanding of death are metaphisical problems. And Funeral doom is obviously about that. Aesthetical problem - the experience of listening or understanding a lyric or a music is an aesthetical problem, and it is very important problem in philosophical sense. Philosophy is not only a kind of esoteric thing, it is a very pratical thing, its more about understanding why we do this, and why we think that, but it transcend all that to create a vision and a compreensive compreension of the experiences and the behaviors of all man, and in the case of funeral doom, the compreension of it essence, that i believe is beyond the lyrics, and music.

Sorry but i dont found any philosophical problem in grindcore, death metal, please give me cases where i can find that.

i think the whole thing on why some people view emptiness, sadness adn the like as something that gets us going is more on a psychological side than philosophical side. like, people will subconsciously tie in their own experiences with the music and feelings stem from that.

i guess i still don't get how individual listeners interpret lyrics an imagery related to music is an aesthetical problem. no one person is going to interpret a song the exact same way. one person may view a certain song as beautiful while another will view it as pathetic, horrid, terrible, whatever. on top of that, no one can fully interpret the music in the way the original artist interpreted it. the artist and that artist alone knows why he/she created the music.

there's something more i want to say, but i can't think of it at the moment.

_________________"The end, again, comes quickly. There will be no pity. A process of revealing. With no apologies, no regrets, she said destroy. Destroy, she said..."

Fri Jul 13, 2007 7:56 pm

silencioeterno

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[Deek wrote] i guess i still don't get how individual listeners interpret lyrics an imagery related to music is an aesthetical problem. no one person is going to interpret a song the exact same way. one person may view a certain song as beautiful while another will view it as pathetic, horrid, terrible, whatever. on top of that, no one can fully interpret the music in the way the original artist interpreted it. the artist and that artist alone knows why he/she created the music.

Of course an interpretation is always a personal interpretation, there is no problem in that, the problem is what made you understand something that is given to you, and why you do that, why you interpret in that sense. That is not only a psichological problem, that is not only about fealings, or about states of mind, but is more about what is your background, what tools you have to interpret in a deepest and more profound sense. I can give you a simple example: you can take a text of Milton, or a Shakespear, or even if you are german a Goethe, Holderlin, or other poet and you obviously can interpret that text by your means, and understand as you want and as you can, but if you have an natural ability to poetry you can understand it better, and if you have the necessary knowledge you can interpret even more profoundly and deeply. The same thing about music, and especially about funeral doom that is related to some themes, and some ideas that are profoundly philosophical - i'm talking about death, sadness, suffering, fear, etc, etc - all interpretation depends in your background and in your knowledge, and in your abilkity to understand it in a more profound and deep sense. Thats what i'm talking about. This is the point i'm trying to explain. Of course you can simply ignore it, you can say that it is not true.

Sat Jul 14, 2007 1:13 am

Deek

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silencioeterno wrote:

That is not only a psichological problem, that is not only about fealings, or about states of mind, but is more about what is your background, what tools you have to interpret in a deepest and more profound sense. I can give you a simple example: you can take a text of Milton, or a Shakespear, or even if you are german a Goethe, Holderlin, or other poet and you obviously can interpret that text by your means, and understand as you want and as you can, but if you have an natural ability to poetry you can understand it better, and if you have the necessary knowledge you can interpret even more profoundly and deeply. The same thing about music, and especially about funeral doom that is related to some themes, and some ideas that are profoundly philosophical - i'm talking about death, sadness, suffering, fear, etc, etc - all interpretation depends in your background and in your knowledge, and in your abilkity to understand it in a more profound and deep sense. Thats what i'm talking about. This is the point i'm trying to explain. Of course you can simply ignore it, you can say that it is not true.

oh, yea, that's what i meant. that was part of what i was thinking that i didn't post, the whole past experience thing. that's where i was going with the psychological thing.

ok, now i'm on the same page with ya, haha.

_________________"The end, again, comes quickly. There will be no pity. A process of revealing. With no apologies, no regrets, she said destroy. Destroy, she said..."

Sat Jul 14, 2007 1:58 am

Kastrophee

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Maybe a bit late, but my view of what Funeral Doom should represent:

Birth: Another insignificant life to enter an endless life only to cause endless suffering to all starting with the agony of the birth mother.

Failure: All that is strived for is useless, all will fail and fall apart.

Grief: Realisation of the failings and the hope is lost, into agony we fall.

Hate: A hate so great that all is viewed as filth, to strive to cause all to hate you so you can suffer more.
Agony: Agony caused by hate to cause more grief and sorrow, a miserable existance with only to tear your own flesh away just to feel something.

Fear: Bloody and dying body begins to fear inevitable death, anxiety, more suffering.
Death: End of the cycle, end of existance, back into the void and hope to be forgotten.

Regret: As My Shameful wrote: "And here I stand at the end of time and see there is nothing I would no regret in my shameful, shameful life".